carleymeiners

One of my 2019 goals is to blog once a month. I already failed January, but here I am half-way through Feb. trying to make up for some lost time.

If I’m honest, it’s a lot harder to blog when your relationship is stable. For years, this blog was filled with heartache and often it was the one thing that made me feel better. Now after a few years from writing consistently (most of the time on a daily basis), it’s much harder to sit down and just write.

BUT, this past Veterans Day I wrote the below for my company’s internal veterans celebration. The Air Force has caused many grievances in our life, but it has taught me far more than I could have ever expected. So in celebration of a belated Valentine’s Day, here’s why I love my relationship with the Air Force:

My husband has been serving in the United States Air Force since 2014. He served in the Cyber Communications field from 2014 to early 2018. Currently, he is in the Air Force Reserves in pilot training. He is set to go fly the C-130 in about 6 months.

There are many lessons I have taken from my husband and his career. Two of the biggest lessons I’ve taken with me are comradery and adaptability, which I strive to apply to my job and our personal life. Comradery is one of the biggest things I love about the military. 

My husband spends the majority of his time during the week with other airmen and women, and we spend a lot of our free time with our Air Force friends. When you tend to move around and experience a lot of high-stress events, everyone becomes closer. It’s not just the military members but also the spouses and families. I love the community the Air Force has given us. 

Adaptability is also a huge lesson I’ve learned not just from how my husband reacts to change but all the change we get thrown into. There are many times when my husband has to leave to go out of town, stay late at work or go in early. Plans are often broken or there are many hurdles to jump through to make them happen. There are many times where our days shift because of the military, and it has just taught me how to be proactive about what I can control and how to be a better person in the chaos. If you think about it, journalists face similar shifts in schedule based on the latest news so it’s something I use on a daily basis.

One of the biggest rewards of being a military spouse is how quickly you learn about your own strength. A lesson I’m not sure I would have gotten elsewhere.

It’s learning to not getting annoyed when I end up spending my evening sitting at the dinner table alone because he was “about to leave,” but two hours later he still isn’t home. It’s being independent when you need to be because of: TDYs, cross-country trips, trainings and the countless other reasons why your spouse has to be away. (We have luckily not faced a deployment, yet.)

It’s learning to accept when the location of your move changes at the last second. It’s having 3 addresses in one year. It’s always having to make new friends. It’s navigating Tricare gracefully (when you really want to scream through the phone).

It’s just not thinking about all the suck.

The biggest thing the Air Force has taught me is how to get out of my comfort zone. I’m not the best with change and making new friends. But luckily I’m learning with each move how to be the best version of myself. (Also why is making friends as an adult so hard!?)

And dare I say, I’m looking forward to the challenges we have ahead of us in the next 3 years as we finish out our full-time military family career. (Someone please remind me of this blog later.)